by C. T. Phipps
I glared at him. “Says the guy who can sleep in a bucket.”
John casually slid Case and Jane’s gold coins into his pile. “Now that’s just mean. I don’t sleep in a bucket unless it’s a full moon.”
“I’ll try and contact them afterward,” I said, pausing. “Apologize. Otherwise, Leia will be so furious that I sent away her bestie.”
“Mindy, too,” Diabloman said. “Jane helped her pick out her supervillain name. Ms. Teri.”
“Mindy is a newborn,” I pointed out. “She should not be worried about codenames. Potty training should be the height of her current ambitions.”
I already had one super-smart child that had inherited hyper-cognition from some alien abductee ancestor or exposure to arcane magical energies, I didn’t need another one. F.I.T (The Falconcrest Institute of Technology) was already throwing grant money at Leia and it was interfering with my attempts to raise her to be unlike Cindy.
And myself.
“Your family is strange,” Diabloman said, before falling silent. There was clearly something weighing on my luchador friend. “Still, I don’t know why you would send away two of your best friends.”
“It’s complicated,” I said.
The truth was I was just sick of losing people. Cloak, Mandy, Ultragod, my brother after his resurrection, and then Mandy again. I didn’t have the strength to keep losing the people I cared for. Maybe it would have been possible to endure if everyone who died came back after a few years. But the thing was I needed to get over that. This was bigger than me, bigger than all of us, and I’d made my choice—I now had to live with it. Or die with it.
“So, am I next to be sent home?” John asked, shaking me out of my fugue. He didn’t look particularly upset at the prospect, but John had about three facial expressions: angry, angrier, and really pissed-off stoic. He was kind of like John Wayne in that respect.
“Well, you aren’t astrally projected but physically here,” I said, frowning. “Also, I thought you’d want to stay here permanently.”
Truth be told, I was already regretting sending away Case and Jane. The fact was that I couldn’t risk them against a bunch of Nazis. Tom Terror had supervillain teams with him down here and could remove powers at will. If he could also bestow them, we were potentially facing an army of fascist super freaks following their Führer. Which meant we were fucked. I still hadn’t figured out a way to help Ken and he was a ticking time bomb of superpowered fury.
“Super Freaks,” John said, singing. “They’re super-freaky.”
I stared at him.
“Rick James?” John asked.
“Sorry, my pop culture references begin at the Eighties,” I said, pretending I didn’t get it. “Wait, they have disco in the wasteland you come from?
“I knew a ghoul who had some records.” John frowned. “Though, honestly, it’s starting to look like this universe isn’t any safer than my own.”
“We’ll deal with the Nazis,” I said, sounding more confident than I felt.
“That’s not the only thing that worries me,” John replied. “Your world is like an acrobat someone is firing a hundred bullets at. It’s possible you might jump out of the way of a few but at least some of those are going to hit.”
“You actually can’t jump out of the way of bullets,” I said, pointing out a fact. “I mean, unless you have superspeed. I tried and I still have scars from it. Thank God for healing factors, am I right?”
“Which god?” John asked, dryly.
“There’s something else we need to talk about,” Diabloman said, probably referring to the undead elephant in the room that was his sister.
“Like why you should vote Merciless for 20XX?” I asked. “Why settle for the lesser evil?”
“No,” Diabloman said. “Also, that’s Cthulhu’s tagline.”
“I stole it,” I said.
“Cthulhu ran for office?” John asked. “That seems a bit out of character for him.”
I chuckled, knowing the eldritch abomination playing cowboy was joking.
“I mean my sister,” Diabloman said, pausing. “I hope you understand why I abandoned you to go work for her.”
“Because you have a history of poor life choices?” I asked. “Obviously, including working for me.”
Diabloman snorted. “I did so because family is the most important thing. It should trump everything else in a person’s life.”
“Except your Satanist family who ordered you to kill Maria in the first place,” I said, pointing out an uncomfortable fact.
“Sí,” Diabloman muttered, looking down. “Ever since I died and was reborn for the second time, I have felt a great weight lifted off my shoulders. I realized I wanted to make atonement for my sins. That started with my trying to seek out my sister and offering my service to her.”
I grimaced, realizing that what Diabloman wanted to do was impossible. He’d killed Maria’s true love and that wasn’t something you could ever be forgiven for. Forget the whole “destroying the universe” thing, he’d personally wronged her in a way that was beyond the pale. She’d forgive her own murder before what he’d done to the Guitarist. Actually, now that I thought about it, he had murdered her, too.
Yeesh.
“You realize Maria’s kind of evil now, right?” I said, disgusted. “What with the whole ‘rape by deception’ thing.” Yeah, there I’d said it. It couldn’t be taken back now. Sorry for everyone who was hoping I’d backpedal on that.
Diabloman didn’t respond for a while. “Sí. I am the person who corrupted her, though. I am the one who will have to redeem her.”
I didn’t have a response to that. “Right.”
I didn’t know if redemption was a real thing outside of Star Wars and Angel. I used to be a big believer in it, but the simple fact was that once you took a life, that was permanent. There were no do-overs for that. I mean, I’d learned that lesson the hard way. There was no making it up to Mr. and Mrs. Goon for the fact I’d killed a few hundred of their relatives. That government agent I’d liquefied this morning had a family somewhere. I mean, yeah, they were probably scumbags like him, but they’d miss him.
Maybe.
Okay, I wasn’t helping my case.
“Maybe you should focus on trying to look after your daughter,” I said, diverting the subject. “If she’s going to become a superhero or supervillain then she’s going to need a lot of training. The Super lifestyle has never been more dangerous.”
Diabloman seemed to think about that. “I agree.”
“Good,” I said. “Now let’s get back to the game. Rocks fall and kill Jane’s and Case’s characters.”
Diabloman wasn’t finished, though. “My daughter is but seventeen. I ask you not to sleep with her.”
“Wait, what!?” I blinked, then got furious. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Diabloman misinterpreted my reaction. “It is not that long a wait.”
“I like women!” I snapped. “Adult women! Specifically, ones I am in love with. Gabrielle can bench-press a tanker truck. I am not interested in cheating on her.”
“You regularly sleep with Cindy. Which is like sleeping with all of Falconcrest City.”
“I heard that!” Cindy called from the other side of the throne room where she was modeling a bunch of Nur’Ab’Sal fashion in front of quicksilver mirrors. “I am a doctor, goddammit, and very safe!”
“My apologies,” Diabloman called out. “You are a very clean harlot.”
“Thank you!” Cindy called back.
“Are you spying on us?” I called over to Cindy.
“Obviously!” Cindy answered back. “I can’t believe you banned me for life from your tabletop games.”
“You cheated!” I snapped.
“Those dice came up twenties on their own,” Cindy said. “The fact that they had metal interiors and I had a magnet was just coincidence.”
“Fair enough,” I said, not really wanting to get into it. “I swear, it’s lik
e people don’t understand that some people prefer to be with one person.”
Which is totally how I felt. I mean, yes, I’d been with other people than Cindy and Gabrielle over the past year while mourning Mandy, but that was business. Sometimes you need to seduce the queen of a country, a supervillainess or superheroine, to get at something like your Okmarian Death Ray or the crown jewels of Londonium. Okay, wow, I had problems. Gabrielle and I needed to establish where we stood. Because, honestly, I wasn’t all that sure these days. I’d tried to offer being exclusive with her, but she’d backed away faster than a speeding bullet.
“It’s just, well—” Diabloman looked embarrassed.
“What?” I asked.
“I thought you and Ultragoddess were having problems,” Diabloman said.
John raised an eyebrow.
“What makes you think that?” I asked, defensively.
“The fact she spends half her time in space and another half flying around the world punching things. The rest of the time, which is nonexistent if you can do basic math, is short dates with you and leaving you to watch the kids. That’s not a healthy relationship. That’s a regular booty call and free babysitting.”
I looked over at Cindy. “You can have the decency to be here when having a conversation with me.”
Cindy walked in, dressed in a large array of jewelry and a strategically placed white wrap that substituted for clothes. “I’m just saying if she likes it, she should put a ring on it. Also, we need to loot this place like there’s no tomorrow.”
I rolled my eyes. “We’re not imperialists, Cindy.”
“Well, why the hell not!” Cindy said. “It’s not racist if we’re doing it just because want their stuff, is it?”
John laughed at that one, which bothered me.
“They have polygamy down here in the Hollow Earth,” Diabloman said, before slamming his fist on the stone table. “You could marry both and they could marry their loved ones. Then you could conquer this land and rule as one large family of intertwined nobility.”
“Pass,” Cindy said, shrugging. “I prefer being the mistress. I’m in Gary’s will anyway. Wait, I am in your will, right?”
“I’m immortal,” I said, remembering what Mercury said about godhood. “Probably. So, I don’t have a will.”
“Dammit,” Cindy said, before realizing what she said. “I mean, good. By the way, if you want more kids, you need to get someone else to birth them. I put on a whole inch because of Leia and while I love her, she’s going to have to pay that back by inventing me a suit of armor or something. I suggest you go seduce Nightgirl and let Galahad find you two in bed. Then I will point and laugh.”
“No,” I said.
“Diabloman?” Cindy asked.
“Marriages are sacrosanct,” Diabloman said. “Or should be.”
“Oh come on!” Cindy said. “That’s not been true since Henry the Eighth.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose to stave off a migraine coming on. “I am not sleeping with anyone else. Gabrielle and I are fine.”
Gabrielle then walked into the room, wearing a toga that stopped before her knees and a little crown. “Gary, we need to talk.”
I knew what that meant. “Goddammit.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
POOLS, POLYAMORY, AND PROPOSALS
It turned out I was very wrong. Gabrielle wanted to spend some private time with me alone in the Room of Pools, which was apparently a Medieval set of hot tubs that were fed by pipes and aqueducts. We were in one of the dozen or so heated baths that had curtains cordoning them off and it was sinfully decadent. Well, that and the fact we were enjoying the two-person pool party the media had celebrated for decades in college-age movies.
“You know, the ancient Romans considered communal bathing to be hedonistic,” I said, relaxing next to Gabriel as she rested her shoulder on mine. Neither of us were wearing any clothes but if this were a comic book, the steam around us would have covered up any naughty bits. You know, assuming someone was reading a comic about us now. I’m talking to you, Jane.
“I can’t imagine why,” Gabrielle asked. “Mind you, these were the people who considered leaving an infant on trash piles a perfectly good way of reducing family size.”
“Were I a supervillain two thousand years ago, I’d go by the Masadan Manhunter and be terrorizing them. In fact, once I run out of Hitlers to kill, I’m going to target Emperor Titus.”
Gabrielle laughed, assuming I was joking. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”
I frowned. “Well, nothing was keeping you from coming around more often.”
Gabrielle sat up. “It’s a hard world to leave without a heroine to protect it. The loss of so many champions to permanent death has left it extra-vulnerable. There’s just not enough new heroes to replace the ones we’ve lost.”
Way to twist the knife, Gabby. “Yeah, especially not with mad scientists turning young black superheroes into young white supervillains.”
“Yeah, what the hell is up with that?” Gabrielle asked, disgusted. “It’s just weird.”
Gabrielle was the world’s most prominent hero right now and, like or not, both she and her father had been political figures simply by being indestructible flying black Americans. Gabrielle might not be especially beloved because of her outspokenness but that was a quality I loved about her. It made her disgust over the treatment of a new hero with a similar background and powers all the more visceral.
“I’ll ask Tom Terror’s ghost.”
Gabrielle frowned. “You need to be careful with Doctor Terror, Gary. He’s the worst foe my father ever faced.”
“Even worse than Entropicus?” I asked, semi-ironically.
“Yes,” Gabrielle said, frowning. “He was the only person my father was ever tempted to kill outright after World War Two.”
“The world would be a better place if he had,” I said.
“Maybe,” Gabrielle said, looking concerned. “He was always an irredeemable monster but my father believed once you opened that Pandora’s Box then you couldn’t close it.”
“Technically, you could close Pandora’s Box, but if you did then you sealed in hope.”
“Gary, don’t be a know-it-all.”
“I don’t know if that’s possible,” I said.
Gabrielle gave a light snort. “I always wanted to live up to his ideals, but I could never believe the law was on our side. Whenever we put on our wigs and glasses, we were just ordinary Americans and that was a constant stream of harassment and suspicion. People cheered Ultragod as the Second Coming then arrested my father for loitering in the Eighties.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I decided to switch subjects. “No shame in being Neutral Good instead of Lawful Good. I think you need to know what Leia and Mindy told me about the future—”
“That I’m not inspiring enough to prevent the apocalypse?” Gabrielle asked.
“Oh, you heard that.”
“Ultra-hearing,” Gabrielle said, tapping her ears.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Gabrielle blinked. “I don’t believe the future is written. I could change my ways and become the perfect little princess they remember me as in my teenage years, then light the way for them. But that would mean making even more sacrifices involving my family. You’re my only family now, Gary, and I refuse to do that.”
I frowned. “Even though I’m a shameless lothario who doesn’t deserve you and has a child by another woman?”
I didn’t know if I wanted Gabrielle putting off her destiny, or non-destiny, since it’d be going against what people said about her future, because of me. I wasn’t worth it. Leia and Mindy were but I’d lived down to my worst expectations as a supervillain. Killing a federal agent was going to cause all sorts of problems for Gabrielle and I didn’t want that. She could save the world if she wanted to and be a torch for the next century.
Gabrielle, to my surprise, took what I said completely differen
tly. “Gary, I don’t care about who else you love.”
I blinked. “Wait, what?”
“We got together while you were with Mandy and Cindy. Not being an idiot, I kind of knew what I was getting into. Just like you did with me.”
I stiffened. “That wasn’t Mandy.”
Maria had shown her true colors and I wasn’t going to back down in our next encounter. Only one of us could rule the world and I was determined to make sure that wasn’t her. Even if I wasn’t sure I wanted to rule the world anymore. Tears for Fears would be so disappointed in me.
“I’m sorry, Gary,” Gabrielle said. “I want to ignore all of the terrible things she’s done, but I can’t—not when I see how much Maria’s name makes you sick.”
It really did.
“So, back to what in the hell now?” I asked, deciding to divert the subject back to my second-favorite topic: sex with beautiful superhumans. The first being Star Wars. Err, I mean my family. They were totally not three. “You’re not bothered by me sleeping with other women?”
“Loving, not sleeping with,” Gabrielle pointed out. “There’s a difference. At least in romantic relationships.”
Yes, if you were twelve. “We should probably be very specific here.”
I also noted she was talking about who else she was with.
“Not Cindy,” Gabrielle said, looking embarrassed. “For multiple reasons. You do realize I’ve been with other people, right?”
I didn’t want names. “Yeah. You’re a woman with a lot of love to give, Gabby. Any man (or woman) would be stupid not to realize that.”
“There’s Rory Macleod, a.k.a Water Horse,” Gabrielle said, not realizing I really didn’t want names.
“Wait, the guy who becomes a flying stallion?” I asked. “What do you even need with a flying horse? You fly!”
I mean, I could think of a few reasons, but I hoped that wasn’t what she meant. Goddammit, that was a mental image that wasn’t going away.
“He’s the immortal protector of Scotland. He hunts Unseelie Fae,” Gabrielle said. “Plus, there’s Ultramind X in the fortieth century.”